'The Ohio £ Naturalist , 
PUBLISHED BY 
The Biological Club of the Ohio Slate University. 
Volume III, 
MARCH, 1903. 
No. 5. 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
Houghton— Muscular and Skeletal Elements in Spelerpes longicaudus 379 
Taylor— On the Autumnal Songseason 394 
Ball — Food Plants of Some Bythoseopidae 397 
The American Association 400 
O. M. B.— Ohio Myeological Club 400 
Derby— Meeting of the Wheaton Club 401 
Griggs— Meeting of the Biological Club 402 
MUSCULAR AND SKELETAL ELEMENTS IN 
SPELERPES LONG ICAU DUS.* 
Henry Spencer Houghton. 
The development of one of our commonest species of Salamander 
affords an opportunity for the study of many interesting prob- 
lems. The author was influenced, however, in taking up a study 
of the skeletal and muscular elements in Spelerpes longicaudus, 
by several considerations. In the first place, there is a surprising 
lack of literature, especially on the latter subject. The question 
of the origination and development of adult muscles and of the 
number and function of transitory larval muscles, and of the rela- 
tion of the two, seems to have been entirely neglected. The 
skeletal elements have been thoroughly worked for the adult form, 
but there are some modifications in the larval skull that have not 
been touched upon. Secondly, this form is abundant, of wide 
distribution, and readily obtainable, and this fact together with 
the facility with which it may be prepared, renders it valuable 
material for laboratory purposes. The work was done in the 
Kmbryologieal Laboratory of the Ohio State University, under 
the direction of Professor F. L. Landacre, and was offered as a 
thesis for the Baccalaureate degree. 
This paper will attempt to cover merely a discussion of the 
skeletal aud muscular elements of a 12 mm. larva, and will be for 
the most part descriptive, a few comparisons only being drawn 
with Rana and Cryptobranchus. 
Spelerpes longicaudus is one of the commonest and most widely 
distributed species of the Plethodontidae. Its general appearance 
and markings are similar to Sp. bilineatus, and they are commonly 
found associated together in nature. Their habits, larval devel- 
opment and the noticeably longer tail of Spelerpes longicaudus 
form, however, distinguishing marks. The larval development 
of Sp. bilineatus is much more rapid than that of its relative ; a 
9 mm. specimen which I observed had both fore and hind limbs 
Contribution from the Department of Zoology and Entomology, IX. 
